The present invention relates to a shear shredder apparatus and, more particularly, to a removable blade shoe for use with a shear shredder apparatus.
Shear shredders are well known and are commonly used to reduce the size of material so that the overall volume of the material is reduced for storage or transportation, or so that particle size of the material is reduced to promote burning or combustion of the material in an incinerator or kiln. The most common application for shear shredders is in the field of waste disposal, where such shear shredders are particularly effective in reducing such items as rubber vehicle tires to chip sizes which promote the burning of the tire material.
A typical shear shredding system includes a support frame having an open top and bottom, and houses a pair of counter rotating shredder blade assemblies. Each shredder blade assembly includes a central shaft and a plurality of individual cutter disks mounted thereon. The cutter disks are spaced apart from one another on the shaft and the pair of counter rotating shredder blade assemblies are positioned with respect to each other so that the cutter disks intermesh with one another. The counter rotation of the inter-meshed cutter disks produce a shearing action within the shearing zone where the two sets of cutter disks intermesh with one another. The waste and scrap materials are introduced into this shearing zone from the open top of the support frame where they are shredded and dropped through the open bottom of the support frame.
As is known to those of ordinary skill, the cutter disks require sharp circumferential edges for efficient operation of the shear shredder. Because prolonged use of the shredders will dull the edges of the cutter disks, it is known to removably mount blade shoes to the outer periphery of the cutter disks so that when the blade shoes become dull, they can be easily replaced. Blade shoes are typically constructed of hardened metallic material, and include bolt-receiving holes bored therethrough to facilitate removable mounting to the outer periphery of the cutter disks. Such blade shoes are typically block-shaped, having flat top, bottom, and side surfaces, which meet at sharp angles. Examples of shear shredders incorporating such removable blade shoes can be found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,931,935 to Holman and 4,560,112 to Rouse et al.
One known problem with such shear shredder devices is that the blade shoes must be continuously replaced so that the shredding disks remain sharp enough for efficient operation. Another known problem with such shear shredding machines is that it is often difficult for the cutter disks to pull certain types of scrap material into the shear zone, such as the steel belts of most tires, because such materials tend to slip with respect to the blade shoes. Accordingly, there is a need for an improved blade shoe which simultaneously increases the life of the blade shoe while facilitating a better grip on the scrap materials so as to pull such scrap materials into the shear zone.